2025 Booker Prize chat

Hi all. Booker fans, here is a place to share your Booker experience. The longlist came out July 29. And five days later the vibe is positive. The list is considered more global than typical lists, with authors born in Canada, the UK, the US, Trinidad, India, Malaysia, Ukraine, Albania; and with heritages that include Japanese, Korean, Hungarian and Jamaica.

Here is the 2025 Longlist

Love Forms by Claire Adam
The South by Tash Aw
Universality by Natasha Brown
One Boat by Jonathan Buckley
Flashlight by Susan Choi
The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai
Audition by Katie Kitamura
The Rest of Our Lives by Ben Markovits
The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller
Endling by Maria Reva
Flesh by David Szalay
Seascraper by Benjamin Wood
Misinterpretation by Ledia Xhoga

I have ordered all twelve released books. Four I had to order from Blackwells as they don't have a US release yet. The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai will be released in September.

I'm listening to Flashlight. It's 18 hours long and i'm only 3 hours in. So far it's a mix. Some things I really don't like, but other things I'm very much into. And I'm looking forward to getting back to it. Ok...specifically I don't like the way she introduced characters and their backgrounds. It's long, drawn out, and mind-numbing. But once she gets past that, I'm in.

I'm reading Endling. Endling is a broken book. The first hundred pages are pedestrian. But that's part of the point. Readers need to keep going. I have about 100 pages left, and I'm thoroughly enjoying it. Light and not, funny and serious. Charming and silly in good ways.

>2 dchaikin: I am past the meta fiction break of Endling and though I didn’t give up I felt inclined to. I have a feeling that on completion I might like the resulting book, but am not yet convinced.

— Next up will be Audition by Katie Kitamura as I already have it. Then I’ll read the others that are available in the US and in audio.

These are - Flashlight by Susan Choi
Flesh by David Szalay
Misinterpretation by Ledia Xhoga
Universality by Natasha Brown
And possibly The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny that will come out after the shortlist is announced. (Sep 23 2025 in audio)

>3 kjuliff: i relaxed after the metafiction. The characters changed from ridiculous to endearing, silly symbols. And the nature of what she was doing became more understandable and less challenging. I guess it disarmed me.

Also that looks like a good bunch. Although I hope you get access to more in the near future.

>4 dchaikin: I was actually interested in the pre-meta fiction part. Are you familiar with the “Ukraine is not a Brothel” movement and movie?

>5 kjuliff: no. I didn’t know about this Ukraine women issue. I got the point there in the beginning, but as book, and as humor, it wasn’t working for me

>6 dchaikin: I see. Well it was quite a large movement (Femen) and the young women involved demonstrated all over the world, including Times Square. Leaders of the movement were imprisoned in Belarus earlier in this century. Ukraine women continue to be “sold” and exploited as they are poor and their looks of blond hair/blue eyes appeal to some Western men. The movement was strongly supported by Western feminists.
The movement was in fact interrupted by the Russian invasion and so I took the first part of of the book as a take-off of the type of men and organizations that exploit Ukrainian women.

I’m yet to finish the book so I might see it in a different context when I’m finished. But the exploitation of Ukrainian women has been big business and protests have taken unusual forms.

Thanks for agreeing to set up this thread, Dan. You're clearly far ahead of me in that I plan to borrow the longlisted books I read instead of buying them, and given my many Real Life responsibilities (Mom, retirement, etc.) you're much more likely to read most if not all of the Booker Dozen.

I'm nearly halfway through Flesh by David Szalay, whose central character is a young Hungarian man who does not form meaningful bonds with women or men and is largely a passive and indifferent actor in the major events of his life, which reminds me most of Meursault in Albert Camus's novel The Stranger. The novel is linear and sparse with nary a wasted word, in the manner of a Miles Davis solo ("Don't play what's there; play what's not there."). It's a very enjoyable read so far, and I should finish it no later than tomorrow.

I don't know what longlisted book I'll read next, as that will depend on which of the other ones I requested from my library arrives first.

>8 kidzdoc: I’m hoping to begin Flesh later today.

>9 dchaikin: See? You're already so far ahead of me that I doubt you can see me in your rear view mirror. 😂

>10 kidzdoc: it’s not a race. My inner-sloth would resist. But we can read Flesh in parallel!

A note about Salzay:Szalay was born in Montreal in 1974 to a Canadian mother and a Hungarian father. His family then moved to Beirut. They were forced to leave Lebanon after the onset of the Lebanese Civil War. They then moved to London. Szalay studied at the University of Oxford. Then worked at various jobs in sales in London. He moved to Brussels, then to Pécs in Hungary.

The inner cover says he grew up in London.

>11 dchaikin: It may not be a race, but there is no question that you read more quickly and have more spare time to read than I do!

Thanks for that background info about David Szalay.

I’m about to start Misinterpretation by Ledia Xhoga. Why? Because it’s short, and I’ve had to put Endling away for a while. I’m almost finished but I have some problems with it.

I was interested in Flashlight by Susan Choi but think I’ll read the New Yorker short story version first. I was amused by the Guardian's review describing it as having “the wide-legged feel of turn-of-the-century fiction: domestically sprawling, geopolitically bold.”
I have high hopes for Misinterpretation.

I’ll probably be reading at Darryl’s pace - yes I know it’s not a competition..

What other Booker longklists books are others reading?

So glad to see a Booker thread, thanks for setting this up. I'm not sure I'm looking forward to Kiran Desai's The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny. She's the only one on the list, I think, who's had a Booker Prize before for The Inheritance of Loss in 2006, which I enjoyed. I also enjoyed her first novel Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard but this one sounds a lot like an 'expat novel' - they are very common among Indian immigrants and tend to become generic beyond a point about the themes they explore (moved abroad, missing home, can't fit, clash of traditional vs modern values, family tension, etc etc). Unless it's very well done - which it might be - it will be one among many.

>14 rasdhar: well, we can’t just till September. It’s not released yet. 🙂

Universality has a lot in common with last year’s Booker’s nomination, Creation Lake. I’m not enamored and remember having quite a different opinion than Dan. I’m wondering if we will be at one on this.

>16 kjuliff: on fb Assembly, an earlier book by the same august, gets excellent feedback, but Universality gets mixed feedback. High satire?

>17 dchaikin: I wouldn’t call it high satire, I’d have to use a thesaurus to work out what I’d call it ;-) . I’m re-reading it to make sure what I think.

I mentioned on my thread that I finally finished Flesh by David Szalay late last night. I'll give it 4 stars, and write a review of it later today. The copy of Audition I requested is available in my local library, so that will probably be the next longlisted book I read.

>19 kidzdoc: I finished last night too. I need to process, though. My feelings are all over.

If you’re interested, Inprint, a Houston literary group, has a free online discussion on Audition on August 24, a Sunday, at 5 PM Eastern time. I plan to join.

>20 dchaikin: I agree, Dan. I need some time to think about Flesh before I write my review of it. My overall impression is positive, but I couldn't easily relate to or sympathize with István, due to his detachment towards the people who were in his immediate orbit.

Thanks for the heads up about Audition. I also requested Flashlight and The South from my local library, so it's possible that more than one book may be available when I return there tomorrow.

Dan was kind enough to invite me to participate in this thread, and I'm doing so with great enthusiasm. I've resolved to read all the books on the longlist this year, preferably by the day the shortlist is announced, or otherwise by the time the winner is announced. I now have all the books, most of them on my e-reader; Seascraper arrived today. And we'll have to wait until after the shortlist for Kiran Desai's books.
Last week I read Universality and this week Endling. They're two completely different books, each with its own voice and style, but I rate Endling higher.

Universality is a fun and original satire on contemporary society, written in a modern style with shifting perspectives and viewpoints that regularly threw me off-guard. The insights are interesting, but I was left feeling somewhat unsatisfied by the end. That ending, in line with the rest of the story, could have been a bit more explosive and surprising. But perhaps that's precisely the point...

Endling is a completely different story. It's an absurd tale with many layers and depth amidst all the nonsense and satire, a mix of ecology, an indictment of forms of exploitation and neocolonialism, social criticism, a real war that suddenly takes center stage, and the author (or the supposed author) who suddenly claims her place in her own book and her own story. I thought it was a fantastic book that will undoubtedly end up on my personal Booker shortlist*.

I started Audition today, and it's one I'm really looking forward to.

It's nice to be able to talk about the same books with different people during the same period. From the reactions above in this thread, I can already tell that opinions on the books vary quite a bit. That's precisely what I like about it, because I always learn something from other people's opinions. Ultimately, an opinion often says more about the person and their outlook on life than about the book itself (although, a bad book won't become better just because someone likes it, I think, but we're talking about the Booker here).

>2 dchaikin: I'm curious about your opinion of Endling. The first part did seem like a lead-in to what was to come. But the meta-section seemed to give the story itself more depth.

>13 kjuliff: I'm curious about what exactly bothers you about Endling.

>16 kjuliff: >18 kjuliff: Have you read Universality yet, and if so, what did you think of it? And of course, I'm also curious about your opinion of Audition.

>21 kidzdoc: Flesh is probably the book I'm least looking forward to. It strikes me as a very masculine, raw read. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on it.

* Maybe we should form a CR shadow jury, since we have 5 members here too :-)

Glad you joined! And Yes, let’s all please disagree! 🙂

>22 Trifolia: but then I agree with your comment here. I’ll have to sit down and write out my thoughts

I think I adored Flesh. Still thinking about it. I don’t think it’s too masculine, it just plays with the trope, if you like. The manner it plays with it is what i liked - the mechanism - sparse prose, tons going on underneath. I called it raging underneath

I just read chapter two if Misinterpretation and i’m pretty into it.

>22 Trifolia: I haven’t finished Endling . I put it aside because I found it was becoming too complicated in audio, and I wanted to take a break. I really liked parts of it, and I thought I would not do it justice if I kept reading iwhile I was slightly confused about where it was going. I was thinking there were too many overlapping modern existential concerns. So I wanted to do justice to the book and look at it when I was in a better frame of mind..

>22 Trifolia: I'm glad to see you here, Monica! I think I will land somewhere in the middle between you and Dan in regards to Flesh; it certainly is a raw and masculine read, as you say, but that is both an asset and a drawback, as it reflects István's inability to alter his life's path and his relationships with those closest to him for the better while also shielding him from the negative consequences of major events in his life (does that make sense?). He leads an absurd and meaningless existence, very similar to The Stranger's Meursault, as I mentioned above, although the most consequential event of his life occurred at the beginning of the novel instead of its end. I was glad I read it, although it won't have a lasting impact on me and, as I think I mentioned, I would be surprised if it made the shortlist.

My next read will likely be Audition, as the copy I had requested is waiting for me in my local library. If Flashlight and The South don't arrive there by next week I may have to request other titles from the nearest branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia, which is only slightly further away and contains a much larger collection than my county library system does.

>22 Trifolia: I need to read Universality again before I can really say what I think about. I didn’t like the structure and found it confusing. I keep trying to go back to check on the different characters.and maybe I’m like it when I read it again but my current view is I think it’s home is in the long list.

I read an interview with Tash Aw about his book, The South which is on the list. The article says:

"The South, he tells me from Kuala Lumpur, where he grew up and still visits regularly from his home in Paris, was originally conceived as an 800-page epic. “That was the whole driving force behind the novel. And then I realised that, actually, I don’t have the stamina or the desire or the interest to read a book like that any more, and so as a writer, it felt slightly artificial to me to want to force myself through such a project. There’s something very hyper-masculine about writing a book like that.

He’s not just talking about the number of pages, but of the claims of narrative authority implicit in much panoramic fiction. “You’re looking at a group of people living through a certain time, a certain period, and assuming that you understand everything that’s gone on in that period; that you understand how those people have survived those historical forces. And in fact, you haven’t. What I wanted to do was to reverse this kind of top-down understanding of what an epic novel is and build it from the bottom up.”

I must say I've never associated big, epic novels with masculinity before, I wonder where this is coming from. In any case, I looked it up and The South clocks in at about 300 pages for anyone who wants to draw conclusions about gender identity from that detail.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/feb/01/tash-aw-theres-something-hyper-mas...

>27 rasdhar: I’ve never thought about this, but maybe it’s something like painting in the 17th-19th centuries: epic battles and heroes for the male painters, flowers and domestic scenes for the women.

>27 rasdhar: i’ve seen posts saying it’s the first of a quartet. Hmm. Also interesting because all the talk on Flesh is masculinity. And The Rest of Our Lives has been characterized as a male All Fours. Seems like messing with masculinity is a theme this year - at least on the Booker.

After reading Audition I am thinking it’s this year’s Held and 2023’s Study for Obedience.

>30 kjuliff: it’s apparently a bit of a marmite book. Demanding some extra from the reader. It will be my next book. I loved SfO. As much as I got into Held, i have found some concerns. But i would need to reread it to address them. They might be nothing.

>31 dchaikin: I agree, it’s a Vegemite book. It takes a lot out of you if you want to get anything from it. If you go into it for quick read you’re not going like it. Let me know what you think of my review.

>32 kjuliff: i looked at your review, but i’m not ready to read it yet. Will come back

>33 dchaikin: I wasn’t asking you to read it straight away, just to comment on it when you read it. As is normal. Maybe you would have preferred, “I’ll be interested in yout comments on my review.” Noted.

So far I have managed to track down and add 11 of the 13 books. Only Seascraper and the Kiran Desai have not been released in Malaysia but The South was withdrawn from bookstores at the insistence of the Malaysian government who seem to have taken some umbrage with the Malaysian author. Either because he has been critical of the government previously or for his advocacy of homosexual rights in a country in which it is still an "offence" resulting in either caning or incarceration or both. I managed to track it down on e-book and it became the first ever e-book I have ever purchased.

So far I have read:

The South
and
Audition
and I rate them in that order. Kitamura is a tremendous writer but I found the plot tweaks both baffling and a little annoying.

Probably Andrew Miller next for me.

>35 PaulCranswick: lovely to see! Please keep updating us here on your progress. I was aware of Aw’s censorship. So silly and offensive.

I loved Misinterpretation. Finished last night. Critics don’t like how it ends and i can see that. About 2/3 in it does a minor plot choice that seemed to accidentally deflate a lot of beautifully built up energy. But - I loved it, to the end.

Started Audition this morning. Katie K is in control, man. Lines like - “He seemed about to reach for my hands before pressing his palms down on the table, remaining in the strange pose for too long…” Precise. Reader, we can’t predict, we’re at her mercy.

Fortunately for me my local suburban library system has met my goal of providing me with four longlisted novels this month. I've already finished Flesh, I picked up Audition on Friday and Flashlight on Monday, and Universality is "in transit" and it will surely be there when I return on Friday. I also requested The South, but it's listed as being "in process," so I'm not sure when it will come. I had only intended to read four longlisted books in August, so now all I have to do is get going on the books I already or soon will have!

>37 kidzdoc: ❤️

>35 PaulCranswick: I found Audition’s plot tweak annoying at first, but went back and reread from the tweak on, and now I think it was essential to the meaning of the book. It all started to gel in my mind, and what I I found odd became obvious. Still, I think it was a little bit too subtle - I might be reading more into it than there is.

>39 kjuliff: I'm on page 35. So intrigued so far. The commentary on this book is rich. And your post adds more to that. My curiosity is ramped up.

>23 dchaikin: I've started with Flesh and I hope I'll like it at least half as much as you did. We'll see but I'll give it a fair try.

>24 kjuliff: Thanks for the clarification. I've also read your other comments in your other posts on threads, and I understand this book is too close to your personal life for you to enjoy it as much as I do. It's a bit of a shame, but understandable, that you stopped reading this book, because I think the ending clarifies a lot. But perhaps you find the satire difficult to digest. I completely understand that. Satire is a very difficult tool when it hits too close to home, although I think for some, it's just a way to mask their fears and anxieties.

>25 kidzdoc: So you and Dan managed to transform a book I wasn't looking forward to at all into one I absolutely wanted to read. You said exactly the right things to pique my interest.

>26 kjuliff: I think it's harder to read Universality in audio format because it plays with form and structure which makes it confusing. I really enjoyed reading it, but was ultimately a bit disappointed. It's too early to know if it'll make my personal shortlist, but I'd be surprised.

>35 PaulCranswick: the first ever e-book I have ever purchased... you've entered the danger-zone, Paul :-)

I finished Audition a few days ago, and it's truly a thought-provoking read. I loved the mirror story of the actress who has to perform a play, where her role in the first half is completely different from the second, especially because she doesn't understand it at first. Just like that actress, we watch her personal story take a completely different turn halfway through, and we don't quite understand it either, until it all somehow comes together... or not. A truly remarkable book to ponder for a long time.
As I already mentioned, Flesh will be my fourth Booker-read.

>41 Trifolia: fun post! I’m fascinated by Audition. 78 pages in now. I think she just described Bruce Willis with dementia…

Audition has my head spinning. In a good way. But really spinning.

There is a somehow wonderful cacophony to this year’s longlist

>41 Trifolia: I'm glad that my minimal and abstruse comments about Flesh helped pique your interest in reading it, Monica.

>43 dchaikin: Head spinning is a perfect descriptor of Audition, Dan! I'm thoroughly enjoying it so far, even though I feel as if I'm on board a small boat in the middle of a windy storm.

>25 kidzdoc: I just finished reviewing Flesh. I didn’t see it as a purely masculine book, although there are men in it. It’s a my favorite from the longest so far. Reviewed on my thread.

>39 kjuliff: I think it is a book that will improve with a re-read, Kate, and if it wins, I will do so sooner rather than later.

>41 Trifolia: You are right, Monica, because I am already scrolling the website I got the ebook from pondering on what book will be next!

>43 dchaikin: Dan, last night I watched an utterly hilarious review of this years longlist by an Aussie booktuber who hated most of the books with an absolute passion. Articulately expostulated but boy is it starkly opinionated.

>46 PaulCranswick: What’s the name of the podcast?

>46 PaulCranswick: this podcaster is no longer my friend! 😆 No seriously, I’m seeing a lot of criticism and i don’t get it. I love the list. It’s so fun. There so much going on at the text level. Rich rewarding cacophony for me!! (Last year i had complaints!)

I finished Audition last night - and I adore this book. It’s a standout for me in a list where i’ve loved every book so far. Audition sets the bar. It’s complicated, percise, playful, prose-rich. It’s open to interpretation, and to selective interpretation. Once you see your idea, and boy do i have one, it’s hard to see any other idea. But it’s there. As Max, the book’s fictional playwright tells us, “Everything I write is based in excavating the minutiae of emotion, inhabiting the nooks and crannies of an encounter.” And yet, that’s just the medium. There are whole different messages on art, writing, performing, reinventing, the story. And those are the more significant purposes!! I’m gawking. It’s all love.

Not everyone likes Audition. But also many opinions go along these lines - i didn’t understand it so it’s not very good. I’m ok with not liking it. But i hate that line of reasoning. ☺️

Next is Love Forms - a description and a sentence, that title, depending on which meaning you chose for “forms”.

>45 kjuliff: Thanks, Kate. I should have time to write my reviews of Flesh and Audition this weekend, and possibly read Universality as well.

I have both the Brown and the Miller (a favourite author) on my TBR shelves, but have barely heard of most of the others, both authors and books. So have been lurking to see what else might be worth exploring, especially as the blurbs have not inspired me. It's certainly an interesting thread so far and, indeed, far more inspiring! I've put some of this month aside to read at least a couple women authors in translation (it's WIT month), so readings may have to wait a bit, but maybe not as long as originally planned!
FWIW, my one actual reading experience of the list was dipping into One Boat whilst browsing my local bookshop. I just could not get out of my head that whilst the first person protagonist was a woman, the author was a man; I never have such a problem the other way round and couldn't see why I was doing so here. Odd.

I just finished Audition, and my initial reaction is to stand up and applaud, as I would for a virtuoso theatrical performance which kept my attention and intrigue until the very last scene. I'll give it 4½ stars for now, and consider giving it another half star after I ponder and possibly reread it a bit.

I picked up Universality from my local library this afternoon, so I'll start reading it tomorrow.

>53 kidzdoc: woot! I’m still in dreamy awe of Audition. Virtuoso is the right word!

>52 Willoyd: One Boat is on order. Some dismissive comments, but i think he has some serious appreciators. That’s funny about the narrator. We are used to women writing men, but not men writing women (because of marketing to cultural sexism. Male narrators sell…)

>54 dchaikin: Right, Dan. Kitamura kept me in suspense in the second half of Audition, and she definitely stuck the landing in its last few pages. I suspect that I'll be reading Intimacies, her earlier novel, soon.

>47 kjuliff: It is called Gunpowder, Fiction and Plot. The chap is erudite and entertaining but hugely opinionated and I often have utterly diametrically opposed views to him on the worth of a book.

I will get to The Land in Winter early next week and I am sure that I'll love it as our Book tuber hated it with a passion!

>56 PaulCranswick: lol. It’s the one I was originally most looking forward to - The Land in Winter. Waiting on Blackwells…

>56 PaulCranswick: Thanks Paul. I watched it. I thought it was very well done. I didn’t agree with his opinion on all the books that I’ve actually read, but I enjoyed the insights he had. Here’s the link for those interested.
I Survived the Booker Prize Longlist 2025

>58 kjuliff: My pleasure, I wanted to give him a nod because, even though his view is diametrically opposed to most of us here his reasoning is well argued and he is very funny.

>59 PaulCranswick: I thought he made some valid points, especially on Universality and Flashlight.

I’ll be following this podcaster. He cuts through all the hype.

>60 kjuliff: Indeed he does.

I must also plug "Ben Reads Good" in which he (Ben) reviews four of the longlist in a more laudatory manner but also very nicely articulated.

I think he is more in tune with this thread's thoughts but he does make some very good thoughts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2glEI7tmU2I

>61 PaulCranswick: Thanks Paul, I just listened to that podcast and unfortunately, I had read only one of the books that Ben reviewed. That was Universality, and I’m glad I listened to it, because Ben made me look again at it. I hadn’t realized it was set in England and for some reason I assumed it was an American book. I’m going to rethink my views on this book.

Back to the Australian guy. It was such a relief for me to hear an Australian review the longlist books. American reviewers tend to take books more seriously and reviews can sometimes benefit from a little humor. I really liked it when Gunpowder said that the Booker selection committee should apologize to the readers for picking such crappy books.

My review of Flesh by David Szalay is here.

>62 kjuliff: I really like both of them for different reasons. Ben is a very thoughtful reader and Gunpowder is as his name suggests a bit explosive.

>64 PaulCranswick: Yep! I’m now subscribed to both of them.

About five minutes in, this Gunpowder guy says about Claire Adams' Love Forms, "This is much more a 'women's prize' book than a Booker Prize book - emotionally complex but not intellectually rigorous." I don't even know how to unpack that, but I lost interest soon after.

>66 rasdhar: another reason I’ll pass. 🙂

I’m reading love forms. It is both emotionally complex and simple in other ways. It’s also an interesting ode to Trinidad and Tobago.

>66 rasdhar: Yikes. I watched about a minute of the Gunpowder podcast but I grew so irritated with his whiny voice and annoyed expression that I didn't make it that far.

ETA: I'll take a brief hiatus from my Booker reading in order to read The Hairdresser's Son by the Dutch author Gerbrand Bakker alongside Kay (RidgewayGirl); it's the latest offering from Archipelago Books.

>67 dchaikin: following up on myself. In Love Forms the narrator, Dawn, just told me, “I’m being completely honest”. And she means it. She is really trying to be a reliable storyteller. Perhaps it’s unfair to call that intellectually simple - attempted honesty. I’m just thinking out loud.

>69 dchaikin: I also try to avoid reading reviews I'm planning to read, as far too often some essential part of the plot is given away, which can ruin my enjoyment of the book. That's also one major reason why I struggle with writing reviews, as I try to avoid spoiling the book for others.

>70 kidzdoc: i do too. That should not be a spoiler, but a descriptor. It’s pretty clear on sentence one.

Love Forms is a terrific novel (even if not Gunpowder friendly). Warm and sincere with some intriguing looks at Trinidad and Tobago over the last 40 years.

I’m working on getting into The South

An interview with Vincenzo Latronico, whose book Perfection was shortlisted for the International Booker this year.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/aug/08/its-another-form-of-imperialism-ho...

"Something similar happened to me. Years ago, a German publisher declined to translate my second novel – a story of ambition and financial speculation – because the Italian backdrop might have confused a German readership used to imagining corporate raiders in New York, or perhaps in Frankfurt. But, he said, the chapters in which the protagonist visited his father in Venice were great, so poetic. Had I considered setting a book in Venice? Italy, for him, had ceased to be seen as a legitimate context for corporate ambition, as it was in Paolo Volponi’s Le Mosche del Capitale, and become a set of exotic backdrops: Naples, Puglia, Rome, the Tuscan hills, or Venice.

This, in a way, is a division of labour: a way the international market for literature has tried to become more efficient by allocating the general discourse to a set of mostly English-speaking writers, while a peripheral circle of local colleagues are outsourced with producing gondolas, popes, crying madonnas, and pizza.

But the landscape described by Mizumura has drastically rearranged itself over the past few years, and the primacy of anglophone literature seems to have faded. The authors in today’s contemporary canon – celebrated by critics worldwide, and imitated by aspiring novelists – come from much more varied backgrounds and write in many more languages. Roberto Bolaño, Annie Ernaux, Han Kang and Karl Ove Knausgård are the Franzens and Wallaces of two decades ago."

He mentions Minae Mizumura's book The Fall of Language in the Age of English. I read it a few years ago and it is very well constructed.

>73 rasdhar: whoa. How interesting

>72 dchaikin: I'm glad that you're enjoying Love Forms, Dan. Who cares what Gunpowder thinks?

>73 rasdhar: That is interesting!